It's different out west

I guess at the heart of it, I have something of a confidence problem.

I think one of the reasons I couldn't stay in that job, is that people looked down on me -- sub-consciously or otherwise. In this part of the country, there's little you can do to cut through the stigmas and preconceived notions people see.

I was the service manager of a mostly-upscale motorcycle dealership. I got into through previous dealings with the shop. I became a good customer, befriended almost everyone there and before I knew it, I had a new place to work when my six year mode of employ came to an end.

It always felt like a summer job to me; one that I couldn't really take seriously, despite the fact that I was actually making semi-serious money. In the end, it felt like a dead end. That, and you had to work every Saturday, with no chance of taking vacation during the summer. Company rules.

I think people were surprised after they spoke with me for a few minutes. It's not to prop myself up or say that I'm the smartest person to ever work in the motorcycle industry -- far from it. But I think people got more than they bargained for after some chat. And, of course, it cut both ways.

I tried like hell to move to Portland, Oregon to work at the greatest motorcycle dealership I've seen. The reasons I think that are numerous. I've been through the doors of hundreds of dealerships, and this one is head and shoulders above any of the others. Maybe it's just a byproduct, or pure chance. But my two trips out there to try to nail down the details had me believe that Portland is the greatest North American city I've ever visited. But there's something else.

On my first night out there, I went to dinner with the general manager of the dealership -- and everyone else. That's how they roll. They're really like a big family. And, a few customers heard that we were all going out, so they tagged along.

At first, I would've told you that at least two of the customers were highly-placed corporate executives with expensive post-graduate degrees in economics or some other complex discipline. One of them worked behind the counter at GameStop, the other a salesman at a car dealership.

The year before that, a friend of mine flew me out to San Francisco to see the inaugural USGP at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway in Monterey, California. It was a truly splendid time, made even more so by some of the people I met out there. The sashimi at the transvestite show bar was also some of the best I've ever had.

But it was the same thing. The people you would take for high-level executives of whatever industry were real, working folks. But different. More like myself, perhaps. It didn't matter what they did for a living. They're just incredibly nice, interesting people who don't have confidence issues, and don't feel the need to tell you everything they think they know so they can convince themselves that they have social worth.

It's nice to meet people who are interested in *you*. Not where you work, or what you drive or whom you know. Nothing else really matters. No pretense, no showmanship, no onanism. Real. People.

You don't get that here in the "Heart of It All."